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Class 

Rnok ' L r ; ' 



Copyright _ 


COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 








































THE LITTLE DUTCH CHILDREN 











T AMB ALO 

And Other Stories of Far Lands 


By 

ALICE ALISON LIDE 

and 

ANNIE H. ALISON 

i 



BECKLEY-CARDY COMPANY 
CHICAGO 

If C« 



'P'Zfl 

.Uni 


Dedicated to 

Kate Perrin Goodman 



>*' 


Copyright, 1930, by 
Beckley-Cardy Company 
All Rights Reserved 


Printed in the United States of America 

©CIA 32196 


0E0 IS ^ 




ABOUT THESE STORIES 

T) EFORE you read this book, I wish to tell you 
something about how Tambalo and the other 
^ stories came to be written. Some of these little 
folks I knew myself. Of some, my uncle, who dur- 
ing his life has been a soldier and has lived in 
many foreign lands, told me. My interest in these 
little foreign cousins of ours like Tambalo, Chim 
Chu, Little Utvik, Peter, Katrinka, Johnny Chuck- 
luk, the Van Neifs, O-kee-ta-wa, Yuma Kax, 
Chong, Bergetta and others—who after all are 
very much like yourself and other boys and girls 
—grew to such an extent that through years of 
study I have come to know and love the people of 
many lands. These little events in their daily 
lives, like herding the water buffalo or fishing 
with the cormorant, are as common to them as 
traveling in an automobile or fishing with a fish- 
pole and hook would be to you. 

Each of the fascinating little foreign-life photo¬ 
graphs illustrating the incidents in the stories 
was snapped in some far, far land. This is a real 
picture of the little boy, Tambalo of Ceylon, and 
[ 3 ] 


About These Stories 

of Tambalo’s special charge, Zat, the big water 
buffalo that led the herd; of Quee-Dee, the cor¬ 
morant who developed into a fine hook-nosed fel¬ 
low almost as big as his master, Chim Chu him¬ 
self; of little Utvik, the Eskimo, and Agoonta, the 
father. There, too, is Peter, whose home was a 
boat that traveled the canals of Holland, and little 
Katrinka Voost, one of the best little knitters in 
the land, and the windmill, the wooden shoes and 
all that goes with the happy Dutch life. And so 
on and on, until at last we drop amidst the mud 
chimneys of an adobe pueblo of an Indian tribe 
in our own West. But sh—keep quiet! the little 
Indian children are playing hide and seek on the 
mud chimney and the roof top. Get right into the 
game yourself, and may you enjoy it. 

Alice Alison Lide 


[4] 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Tambalo and Big Zat.9 

A Story of Ceylon 

What Nang Po Found Out.14 

A Tale of China 

Chim Chu and the Treasure Egg.20 

The Cormorant 

Little Utvik, the Eskimo.29 

An Eskimo Camping-Ground 

IOMAHDA AND THE IVORY.34 

An Alaskan Trading Post 

Ging's Picture Letter.43 

Fishing in the Arctic Circle 

Johnny Chuckluk.49 

A Little Boy of Southern Alaska 

O-Ke-Chan and the Kindergarten.54 

A Japanese Mission School 

Peter and the Windmill.60 

Dutch Home Life 

Katrinka’s Star. 66 

The Meteor 

Bergetta’s Geese .74 

The Canals of Holland 

Three Little Van Neifs.79 

The Milk Cart 


[5} 













Contents 

PAGE 

Bianchi and Little Brown Beppo.84 

The Mischievous Monkey 

Yuma Kax .90 

An Aztec Prince 

O-KEE-TA-WA, THE SHY ONE .92 

An Indian Story 

YUNI AND THE MOKSA.101 

In Far-away Korea 

Wo Ni Ta .109 

The Peking Language School 

When Ah Loo Thought Quickly.116 

A Story of Little Chinese Folk 

Little Eskimo A-taq and the Moon Story . . . 122 

A Home in Greenland 

Long Chong, Short Chong.127 

The Little “Looking-Glasses” 

Yano and the Dragon Wagon.. 131 

The Fighting Gander 

“The Honorable Little Gentlemen” .... 138 

A Story of Silk Worms 

Wang Chu and the Robber.142 

An Exciting Night 

Po Po’s Wonder Water.149 

Drilling a Well in Soochan 


[6} 












TAMBALO 

and Other Stories 
of Far Lands 




TAMBALO AND PIDU AND THEIR SISTERS 






TAMBALO AND BIG ZAT 
A Story of Ceylon 

How would you like to study your les¬ 
sons from a wooden tablet full of carving, 
instead of out of a school book? That is 
the way Tambalo and Pidu, two little 
dark-skinned boys of Ceylon, and their two 
little sisters learn to read. 

They do many other queer and interest¬ 
ing things besides that. They help their 
mother cut coconut shells into cups and 
spoons, and plait palm leaves into plates 
and dishes. When they get a little older, 
they will help their father carve the great 
trunk of a palm tree into every sort of 
useful thing, from a knife handle to a 
doorpost. And maybe, some day, they 
will hollow out a larger palm tree into a 
[9] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
long, slender canoe in which they can pad¬ 
dle in the Gulf of Manaar that sweeps one 
side of their island home. 

One fine thing that Pidu and Tambalo 
do is to help herd the buffaloes. In Ceylon, 
folks plow their fields with buffaloes in¬ 
stead of horses and mules. The Ceylonese 
boys have the job of driving these great, 
long-horned animals to and from pasture. 
And the buffaloes usually love their little 
boy masters better than anybody else in 
the world. 

Tambalo’s special charge was Zat, the 
big bull buffalo that led the herd. The 
boy looked very tiny when he sat astride 
the huge animal’s neck and guided him 
by merely a nudge of his bare toes, or by 
softly spoken words. Tambalo was a care¬ 
ful herdsman and always saw to it that 
his buffaloes were driven down for a daily 
[ 10 ] 



Tambalo and Big Zat 


©Ewing Galloway 

ZAT, THE BIG BUFFALO THAT LED THE HERD 

bath in the cool waters of a stream that 
flowed through their feeding ground. For 
the buffalo is a peculiar animal and must 
have his bath, if he is going to be con¬ 
tented. 

One day a white man happened to come 
through the buffalo pasture. There are 

[ii] 







Tambalo and Other Stories 
not many white people in Ceylon, and this 
was the first of the pale-faced ones that 
had ever come to the out-of-the-way vil¬ 
lage where Tambalo and Pidu lived. 

Buffaloes are quite used to brown folks, 
but they do not like white folks at all; 
they seem to hate pale faces. So, when this 
white man came into the pasture, the buf¬ 
faloes began to get excited and angry. 
They threw up their heads and pawed the 
earth. Tambalo had never seen Zat in such 
a fury. The great animal horned up the sod 
in showers and lowered his massive head 
for a charge. In another minute he would 
have gored and trampled the white man 
to death. 

Then Tambalo did a very brave thing. 
Scared as he was, he rushed up to the 
bellowing Zat, grabbed him by the nose 
ring and began to talk softly to him. The 
[ 12 ] 


Tambalo and Big Zat 
brown boy’s voice seemed to soothe the 
animal, and all of a sudden old Zat stopped 
bellowing. He meekly lifted his head and 
let the little master he loved guide him 
quietly away. All the other buffaloes 
stopped their bellowing to follow him, for 
old Zat was their leader. 

And because of the courage of the little 
brown boy, Tambalo, the white stranger’s 
life was saved. 


[ 13 ] 


WHAT NANG PO FOUND OUT 
A Tale of China 

Nang Po threaded one needle, threaded 
another needle, and then peered excitedly 
through the fantastic bamboo lattice work 
of the schoolhouse balcony. 

“Oh, my!” she squealed, “oh, my! Look 
at the banners and the funny men on 
stilts! Must be a parade!” 

Ling Wee paused in her needle-thread¬ 
ing, too. “Hear the drums, the cymbals! 
Let’s go!” 

“Let’s go!” echoed 0 Man, her fat little 
yellow butterball of a brother. 

Only Li Loo kept on poking thread 
swiftly into round-eyed needles. “B-but 
we can’t go,” said Li Loo anxiously. 
“ ’Cause we promised to stay and help 
[ 14 } 


What Nang Po Found Out 
teacher and everybody with the sewing. 
It—it has to be done,” she ended earnestly. 

“Of course it has,” agreed the others, 
resolutely turning their backs on the al¬ 
luring street sights. So back to work with 
a right good will went the little almond- 
eyed Chinese maidens and tiny American 
Betty, the missionary’s daughter, who had 
the happiness to go to school here, too. 

Behind them, the long sewing room of 
the school buzzed like a beehive. “Snip! 
snip!” clicked the scissors, as many gar¬ 
ments were cut out. And how the big 
girls chattered, as they sewed away on 
jackets and tiny trousers! 

There had been a great flood in the val¬ 
ley of the Noango. Whole villages had 
been washed away. And there were so 
many children left homeless and in need. 
That was why the teachers and pupils of 

[ 15 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
the school were sewing so busily; they 
wanted to send off boxes of warm cloth¬ 
ing to the flood sufferers. 

Li Loo and her classmates were too 
small to sew nicely. Their seams, some¬ 
how, just would turn out puckery and 
crooked. So, in the end, because they did 
want to help, they volunteered to thread 
all the needles for all the workers. It 
was turning out to be a big job, too. The 
garments just seemed to eat up thread. 
But the little girls kept pluckily at their 
self-appointed task. All through the long 
afternoon they toiled, till their fingers 
almost got cramps and their slanting 
black eyes felt strained from looking at so 
many needle eyes. Even the plump, butter- 
colored 0 Man, who obligingly did errands 
back and forth, felt a great weariness in 
his sturdy little legs. 

[ 16 ] 



©Underwood and Underwood 

THE ALMOND-EYED CHINESE MAIDENS 
(With little American Betty. Can you find her?) 




Tambalo and Other Stories 

Then, at last, the teacher came out, her 
face all shining. 

“They are finished,” she cried, “fin¬ 
ished! Every single jacket and pant-leg 
of them all! And we never could have 
done it, if you dear, dear children hadn’t 
helped so much, too. Now, run along out 
to the jessamine vine and see what you’ll 
find.” 

And there, beneath the arbor, the chil¬ 
dren found a tiny, low table spread with 
little cakes and candied rice balls and wee 
cups of orange-blossom tea. 

After the dainties had been eaten, there 
was time for a romp in the dusk. As 
they frolicked through “leap frog” and 
“flower basket” and “skin the snake” and 
a host of other games dear to the hearts 
of little Chinese boys and girls, Nang Po 
suddenly paused. 


[ 18 ] 


What Nang Po Found Out 
“Why—why,” she exclaimed, “this is 
lots more fun than following that parade 
would have been! Is it because we did 
something for somebody else first, do you 
guess?” 

“Do guess,” echoed plump 0 Man hap¬ 
pily. 


[ 19 ] 


CHIM CHU 

AND THE TREASURE EGG 
The Cormorant 

Chim Chu wanted to earn some money. 
Oh, my, how much he did need it! 

You see, his Cousin Wong had come 
home to the little seacoast village, from 
the big city of Nangcha, where he had 
been getting an education at the wonder¬ 
ful school taught by an American doctor. 
Besides many things out of books, the 
doctor man taught boys how to play that 
queer American game called “baseball,” 
which stretches their legs and makes them 
grow sturdy and strapping. And they 
could join the Boy Scouts there, too. 

The Chinese Scouts, just like their 
American brothers, had their hikes and 
[ 20 ] 


Chim Chu and the Treasure Egg 



drills and camps, and best of all, they 
did not forget to do good deeds. 

The more Chim Chu thought about it, 
the more he longed to go to that great 
school. But there wasn’t any money to 
pay for the long journey from the village 
to Nangcha. For Chim Chu’s father had 
so many children, it took all he could earn 
[ 21 ] 




Tambalo and Other Stories 

to keep a roof over their heads and fill 

nine hungry mouths with rice. 

Chim Chu could not have a little garden 
patch and raise vegetables for sale. For 
land is so precious in crowded old China, 
that Father Chim needed every crack and 
corner of the field for his own crops. 

And Chim Chu could not join a pig club 
and raise a fat porker for sale, because 
pigs are so expensive to keep in China, 
that only rich folks can have them. 

But one day, as Chim Chu was scram¬ 
bling about among the great cliffs that 
overlook the shore, he found something 
that stirred his imagination to seeing all 
sorts of visions of school. To you and me, 
though, his find would have seemed noth¬ 
ing more than a big, oval egg with a thick 
coating of lime chalk. 

It must have been a most valuable find, 
[ 22 ] 


Chim Chu and the Treasure Egg 
however, for the Chinese boy took off his 
jacket and carefully wrapped the big egg 
up in it to carry it home safely. 

Then he persuaded Mother Chim to let 
him put his egg under a plump, speckled 
hen who was brooding over a whole nest¬ 
ful of chicken eggs. When Speckle 
hatched, off she came with the queerest 
birdling in her flock of chickens. The 
stranger from the big egg was a downy, 
long-headed fellow with web feet. He was 
not a gosling nor a duckling, though, but 
something far different. 

Chim Chu named his pet “Quee-dee,” 
from the funny little chirruping sound he 
made as he waddled around behind his 
young master. 

Quite early Chim Chu started his train¬ 
ing of Quee-dee. Just as we train dogs 
to hunt, or horses to plow for us, so the 
[ 23 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

Chinese boy began training his bird to 

do something useful. 

Every day Chu took the web-footed 
Quee-dee to a little pond not far away, 
and let him dive for fish. And whenever 
he caught a fish, the boy whistled loudly 
and pulled the bird back to shore by a 
long string tied to his leg. Soon the smart 
bird learned to bring in the fish when he 
heard his master whistle for it. 

You see, the bird hatched from the big, 
chalky egg was a cormorant, one of those 
great, fishing birds of China. For hun¬ 
dreds of years the men along the Chinese 
shore have trained these birds, which 
sometimes grow to be three feet tall, to 
fish in the sea for them. 

Of course Quee-dee did not get to be a 
three-footer in his first summer. However, 
under Chim Chu’s kind care and petting, 

[ 24 ] 



















Tambalo and Other Stories 



©Ewing Galloway 

THE LITTLE FISH WERE FOR HARD-WORKING 
QUEE-DEE’S SUPPER 

the young cormorant developed into a fine, 
hook-nosed fellow almost as big as Chim 
Chu himself. 

Soon the boy began taking the cormo¬ 
rant out to sea in a boat. And now that 
real work had begun, he would slip a 
metal ring over the bird’s neck, so that 
[ 26 ] 




Chim Chu and the Treasure Egg 
Quee-dee would not “accidentally” swal¬ 
low the fish. 

Quee-dee was a wonderful diver. With 
a swoop and a swish, he would plunge be¬ 
neath the waves and come up, always with 
a fish in his beak, which he bore back to 
his whistling master. By night there 
would be, in the bottom of the boat, a 
great pile of big fish that brought a fine 
price at the market, and another smaller 
pile of little fish for hard-working Quee- 
dee’s supper. 

Before the year was out, the fisher boy 
and his fisher bird had earned enough 
money to pay for the journey to the city 
school far away. 

So you see it really was a treasure egg 
that Chim Chu found that day on the 
cliffs. 


[ 27 ] 



©Ewing Galloway 


AGOONTA, THE FATHER 




LITTLE UTVIK, THE ESKIMO 
An Eskimo Camping-Ground 

Little Utvik, the Eskimo lad, was quite 
happy and excited. His family, along with 
all the other village families, were leav¬ 
ing their winter huts, built of stone and 
sod, to travel out to the spring camping- 
ground by the sea. 

In Utvik’s land, spring meant weather 
still bitter cold, and snow on the ground, 
and the shore waters still a mass of bro¬ 
ken ice. But even if it was very cold and 
the winds did blow, the Eskimo boy 
thought it was lots of fun to be going on 
a journey. 

Upon snowshoes he and Agoonta, his 
father, sped swiftly beside the walrus-hide 
sledge, drawn by six great dogs. 

[ 29 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

“Huh! Huk!” they shouted at the 
shaggy team. 

Upon the sledge rode Me-tu, his mother, 
and Noonak, his little sister. 

The Arctic day was almost at an end 
when the Eskimos reached the camping- 
grounds. Here all was bleak and bare, 
with no sign of a hut or shelter. However, 
these folks knew all about how to make 
themselves comfortable. They set right to 
work building a village. With their long 
knives the men cut out great blocks of 
snow. Using these in place of brick or 
stone, they soon built a whole row of little, 
round-topped houses, all gleaming white. 
Within these cozy snow huts the women 
tramped down the ground until it was 
hard, spread fur rugs over everything, 
and lighted the little stone lamps, filled 
with seal oil. 


[ 30 ] 


THE ESKIMOS SET RIGHT TO WORK BUILDING A VILLAGE 






Tambalo and Other Stories 

Agoonta and Me-tu had worked hard 
and fast and they were both very tired 
when they had finished their snow hut. 
Then Agoonta made a sad discovery. He 
had lost his best spear. It must have 
bounced off the sled, back by an ice hillock 
where the trail was all ridged and rough. 
Weary as he was, the tall hunter started 
right out on the search; but Utvik called, 
“Wait, wait, I’ll go!” 

Away raced the boy, with Nuk, his dog, 
at his heels. 

On and on he went, but the ice hillock 
seemed far away, and it was getting dark, 
too. Then he heard something “pad-a-pad- 
ding” behind him. Could it, oh, could it 
be a wolf, or a white bear? 

Utvik kept looking anxiously over his 
shoulder and he scampered along as fast 
as he could. 


[ 32 } 


Little Utvik, the Eskimo 

At last, quite close to the ice hillock, he 
found the ivory spear. Back toward home 
he started, brandishing the long weapon 
defiantly at the unseen thing that was 
trailing him. 

Suddenly there came a thud in the snow 
and a little scream. Utvik ran forward 
excitedly and found — why, he found just 
his little sister, Noonak! She had slipped 
away from Mother and it was she who 
had come “pad-a-padding” down the trail 
behind him. 

Utvik had to laugh to think how badly 
she had scared him. Then he lifted her 
up to ride on shaggy old Nuk, and soon 
he had the little lost girl and the big lost 
spear safely back at the beautiful camp 
of snow huts. 


[ 33 ] 


IOMAHDA AND THE IVORY 
An Alaskan Trading 1 Post 

Iomahda and her little sister, Chitka, 
were Eskimo girls of that Arctic part of 
Alaska where the icy waters of Kotzebue 
Sound sweep against the shore line. Their 
home was in a village with the very funny 
name of Tasakaluka. 

One autumn day there was great ex¬ 
citement there. Adahk, the hunter, and 
his dog sledge were back from a long 
journey to the south. There he had seen 
a ship of the white man and had traded 
his furs for knives and cloth and all sorts 
of things. These he had brought back 
with him, and to the Eskimos they seemed 
strange and wonderful. 

Adahk had also brought the news that 

[ 34 ] 














Tambalo and Other Stories 
in the coming spring, the great ship would 
press further north, maybe almost up to 
Tasakaluka village itself. Then everybody 
could barter for the white man’s goods; 
that is, everybody who had anything to 
barter. 

At once the villagers began preparing 
for that spring trading. The men, armed 
with their flint-pointed arrows and with 
spears of bone, hunted valiantly for the 
shaggy white bear and the tough-hided 
walrus. The women and the children 
searched along the shore for those things 
which Adahk said the white men valued, 
walrus ivory and walrus teeth; and for 
the rare, long, pointed horn of the nar¬ 
whal. 

The keen-eyed Iomahda was lucky. She 
found a creamy white tusk of some long- 
gone walrus, and also a pile of the little, 

[ 36 ] 


Iomahda and the Ivory 

round, hollow bones such as the Eskimos 
cut into beads. 

Poor little Chitka! In spite of many 
weary miles walked on her pudgy little 
legs, the only thing she could find was one 
little old piece of ivory that had turned 
green from lying half-buried in the earth 
for years, for centuries, maybe. 

“ Ya , ya, little one, it is no good,” the 
other searchers told her in kindly derision. 
“Might as well throw it away.” 

But Chitka stuck it in her leather pook- 
sak. Even if it was not worth anything, 
she did not like to go home empty-handed. 

When the winter snows and the winter 
darkness descended upon the Eskimo vil¬ 
lage, everybody kept exceedingly busy. 
By the light of their flickering, flaring, 
seal-oil lamps, the men set to making odd¬ 
shaped bowls, and to carving the white 

[ 37 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
ivory into crude ornaments and into 
knives with decorated handles. The women 
sewed the furs into clothing 1 and shaped 
the walrus hide into muckluks, as the 
Eskimos call their waterproof boots. 

Even Iomahda was industriously mak¬ 
ing something for the spring trading. 
With a sharp-edged flint, she filed away 
on the bits of bone, making them into 
beads. She patiently pieced together 
scraps of reindeer hide to make an Es¬ 
kimo doll. Its seams were carefully sewed 
with sinew thread and a bone needle. Next 
Dolly was stuffed hard and tight with 
sand, and then the young seamstress pro¬ 
ceeded to dress her in fur garments fash¬ 
ioned like those the Eskimos themselves 
wear. 

Poor Chitka was too little to file beads, 
too little to handle a needle and thread. 

[ 38 ] 


Iomahda and the Ivory 
It made her feel blue to think that she 
would have nothing at all to barter ex¬ 
cept the old, discolored bit of ivory. 

To comfort her small sister, Iomahda 
used, once in a while, to take a flint point 
and carve something on the bit of green 
ivory. First, at one end, she outlined a 
little fish. Another time, it was tooka- 
lakeeta, the Arctic butterfly, that she 
scratched on it. Last of all, she did a 
picture of the way the Eskimos think the 
north wind looks. Because the north 
wind blows everything upside down, the 
little brown folks of the Arctic think he 
is a man made upside down with eyes and 
mouth set lengthwise in his face, and a 
nose turned up instead of down. 

When the dark, six-months’ winter was 
over, and spring and the sun came back, 
the ship of the white man came, too, right 

[ 39 ] 



©Ewing Galloway 

CHITKA’S BIT OF GREEN IVORY AND IOMAHDA’S 
CARVING ON IT BROUGHT THEM TREASURES 



Iomahda and the Ivory 
up the coast and down into Kotzebue 
Sound, where the village of Tasakaluka 
lay. 

It was like a great fair, with the Es¬ 
kimos bartering their furs and walrus 
tusks for the steel knives and cloth and 
shining tin ware and many other strange 
things from the ship. 

The thrifty Iomahda had a whole packet 
of wares to barter. And because she was 
a kindly soul, she let the small Chitka put 
the bit of green ivory into the packet, 
and told her they would share all the 
proceeds, half and half. And you may be 
sure this made little Eskimo Chitka hap¬ 
py; for she did so want some of the shin¬ 
ing foreign “pretties.” 

Iomahda exchanged the doll for many 
needles, slim, fine bits of steel that went 
through a deerskin seam, oh, so easily! 

[ 41 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
The beads and the white ivory bought 
shiny metal plates and cups for her and 
little Chitka. 

And the green ivory! It was most 
strange about that. The white man seemed 
to think it especially precious because of 
its curious color and because of Iomahda’s 
drawings on it. So, for it, he gave each 
of the girls a dress of fine plaid cloth and 
a pretty velvet hat. To the Eskimo chil¬ 
dren, who had never known anything but 
underwear made of birdskins with the 
feathers on, and outer garments made of 
shaggy furs, these woven cloth dresses 
were very wonderful. They loved to touch 
and smooth them. 

And just to think, it was that tiny bit 
of green ivory and Iomahda’s queer carv¬ 
ing on it that had brought them these 
treasures! 


[ 42 ] 


GING’S PICTURE LETTER 
Fishing in the Arctic Circle 

Eskimo Ging lived in a round-topped 
stone igloo or house with Glook-a-ta, his 
grandfather. 

On this day Ging was all alone, for old 
Glook-a-ta had gone out on the frozen sea 
to bore a hole in the ice and try to catch 
some fish. 

The whole morning Ging kept so busy 
that he did not have time to get lonesome. 
He made some new moss wicks for the 
stone lamp, and arrows for his whalebone 
bow; and he sewed up a piece of walrus 
hide into a ball, which he stuffed with 
sand. 

After he had eaten his dinner of dried 
fish and seal meat, he began to grow 

[ 43 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

worried. His grandfather did not usually 

stay so long. 

Right in the midst of his worrying, 
there came a scratching at the igloo door. 
Ging jumped up, trembling all over. It 
might be hungry wolves trying to get in! 
As he peeked out, a great shaggy creature 
leaped against the igloo wall. Then it 
barked and whined, and Ging knew it 
was Bik, his grandfather’s hunting dog. 

Ging gladly let Bik in and, as he petted 
him, he felt something hard tied to the 
dog’s neck. It was a bit of walrus bone, 
and upon it were scratched pictures. Here 
was a man standing beside a big pile of 
fish, and here was a dog hitched to a sled 
coming toward him. 

“A pretty lot of pictures,” you and I 
might have said, and that would have been 
the end of it. 


[ 44 ] 



©Ezving Galloway 


GING BEGAN TO GROW WORRIED 





Tambalo and Other Stories 
But Ging had received things like this 
before. He knew that this piece of bone 
was really a picture-letter from his grand¬ 
father; so he sat down to study it out. 



Suddenly, he gave a glad shout! Why, 
it was as plain as day what the picture- 
letter meant! His grandfather had caught 
a great many fish and wanted the sled in 
which to bring them home. 

Ging got out the long, walrus-hide sled 
in a hurry, and hitched Kee and Yaw, the 
sled huskies, to it. With wise old Bik to 

[ 46 ] 









Ging’s Picture Letter 
lead the way, they soon came to Grand¬ 
father Glook-a-ta. Sure enough, he had 
caught a whole sled-load of silvery fish 
and needed Ging to help get them home. 

Old Glook-a-ta felt proud that his little 
Ging was able to read picture-writing. 


[ 47 ] 





©Ewing Galloway 

JOHNNY CHUCKLUK AND HIS MOTHER 






JOHNNY CHUCKLUK 
A Little Boy of Southern Alaska 

Peggie Pearl lived in a white cottage 
with green trimmings. And not far down 
the street, Johnny Chuckluk lived in an¬ 
other green and white cottage just like 
it. Now this may seem strange. For John¬ 
ny Chuckluk was the cunningest round, 
brown Eskimo baby imaginable. He had 
jolly black slits for eyes and a wide little 
mouth that was always quirking up at the 
corners. 

Just say “Eskimo,” and most of us think 
of white bears and whale blubber and 
snow huts. However, little Eskimo John¬ 
ny Chuckluk lived in a house like yours 
or mine. For years ago, long before he 
was born, his folks had moved down from 

[ 49 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
the Arctic Circle into a more southern 
part of Alaska. There, where Cape Prince 
of Wales juts out into Behring Strait, they 
lived among white people and came to be 
like them in many ways. 

There were some queer things in Johnny 
Chuckluk’s home, things that fascinated 
Peggie Pearl when she went there to play 
with the Eskimo baby. On the wall hung 
a miniature oomiak, a tiny, perfectly 
made, toy boat, exactly like the open boats 
of skin in which Eskimo women paddle 
about. Nearby hung a little, flat, round 
drum made of skin stretched tightly over 
a ring of bone. With its funny long han¬ 
dle, it looked more like a frying pan than 
a drum. Mother Chuckluk had some curi¬ 
ous cups carved out of musk-ox horns, and 
a necklace of walrus teeth. 

And Johnny Chuckluk himself had a 

[ 50 ] 


THE OOMIAK IN WHICH ESKIMO WOMEN PADDLE ABOUT 
















Tambalo and Other Stories 
real Eskimo rattle, made of a hollow bone 
half filled with little pebbles. All these 
things the little brown folks had brought 
with them, when they traveled down from 
the land of the midnight sun. 

One day a terrible thing happened. Peg¬ 
gie Pearl had come visiting, and while she 
was entertaining the brown baby on the 
floor, Mother Chuckluk went to a neigh¬ 
bor’s for a minute. Suddenly Johnny 
Chuckluk, who had been happily thumping 
the floor with his hollow-bone rattle, 
began to give little choking cries. His 
face grew mottled and then almost black. 
He was choking to death. 

Peggie Pearl grabbed him up in her 
arms and screamed. In a flash, she saw 
what had happened. His rattle had broken 
and he must have popped a pebble into 
his mouth and it had slipped down his 

[ 52 ] 


Johnny Chuckluk 

windpipe. Peggie Pearl screamed again. 
Then she realized that screaming would 
not do any good. If she was going to save 
Johnny Chuckluk’s life, she must do 
something herself, and do it quickly. 

She scrambled up into a chair and 
turned Johnny Chuckluk upside down. 
Holding tightly to his little brown heels, 
she began to shake him. Oh, my, how hard 
she did shake him! All of a sudden, out 
came that pebble! And Johnny Chuckluk 
could breathe again. 

Mother Chuckluk was very thankful 
that Peggie Pearl had saved the brown 
baby’s life. In fact, she was so thankful 
that she sent as a present to the white 
girl something that she had always 
wanted. Can you guess what? Why, the 
funny little round, flat, skin-and-bone 
drum with the handle like a frying pan. 

[ 53 ] 


O-KE-CHAN AND THE KINDER¬ 
GARTEN 

A Japanese Mission School 

O-Ke-Chan had curly hair. Think of 
that—a little daughter of Japan with 
curls! Oh, it was dreadful! For, you see, 
in Japan, everybody thinks that only 
straight hair is beautiful. 

O-Ke-Chan wisely decided that if she 
could not be pretty, she would have to be 
smart. So she studied hard to learn the 
things taught by the native teacher who 
had been educated in America. Here 
many little poor children went to school 
free. The children were very happy here. 
They learned to play games and sing; 
they learned to read and draw and paint; 
to paste pictures and make clay apples 

[ 54 ] 










Tambalo and Other Stories 
and to march. Sometimes they played 
queer American games that Miss Teacher 
taught, and on other days they read the 
beautiful tales of Japan. And, best of all, 
sometimes the class sat in a big circle 
about Miss Teacher and held its excited 
breath and scarcely blinked its black eyes, 
while she told stories—wonderful stories 
of the far land across the waters where she 
had gone to school. 

There was one sad thing about the kin¬ 
dergarten, though—it was not big enough. 
When, in the “Game of Greeting,” Shimizu 
San bowed her head this way and that, 
“bump!” it was likely to hit Naro on the 
topknot. And when Naro in her turn 
bowed, she was most dangerously close to 
bumping right through the shoji (sliding 
paper door). The kindergarten was cer¬ 
tainly jammed and packed, in its one 

[ 56 ] 


O-Ke-Chan and the Kindergarten 

small room! And Miss Teacher did not 
have any money to make it bigger. 

Then one day a strangely exciting thing 
happened. A Japanese gentleman, Mr. 
Yamisura, the tea merchant, who had 
often halted in passing to watch the pretty 
games of the children of the Kindergarten 
of the Star, paid a brief call at the small 
school room. He had come, he said, to 
see if he could hire the kindergarteners 
for an afternoon, to play the queer Ameri¬ 
can games for his guests at an entertain¬ 
ment he was giving. 

Play their games in public—on a plat¬ 
form! The children drooped their heads 
in embarrassment. The very thought 
made them feel timid and scared. 

At first O-Ke-Chan was as timid as any 
of them. But beneath her curly mop of 
hair splendid thoughts began to awaken. 

[ 57 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
Why, if the kindergarteners went as en¬ 
tertainers, they could earn some money to 
make their dear schoolroom bigger; then 
more children could come. 

“I’ll go,” she said, jumping to her feet. 
“Who’ll go with me?” 

“I!” and “I!” and “I!” the others began 
to answer, inspired by her confidence. 

So the Kindergarten of the Star, with 
its teacher, went to the big house of Mr. 
Yamisura. And just after the monkeys 
in red jackets had performed, the fifteen 
cunning little Japanese girls from the 
school came forward to sing their songs 
and play their games. How pretty they 
were in their gay kimonos, as they swayed 
and bowed and sang in their little high 
voices! 

Last and best, they sat in a circle, and 
O-Ke-Chan told the beautiful, wonderful 

[ 58 ] 


O-Ke-Chan and the Kindergarten 

stories of far-away America, just as Miss 
Teacher always told them. Mr. Yamisura 
and his guests seemed to like this part 
of the entertainment best of all. 

Then the little girls were ready to go 
home. And they felt very happy, for they 
had earned something to help enlarge 
their school. 


[ 59 ] 


PETER AND THE WINDMILL 
Dutch Home Life 

Tall Father Van der Groote and plump 
Vrouw Van der Groote and Mina and 
Nana, the Van der Groote twins, all lived 
in a funny house that was built right into 
the bottom of a windmill tower. A delight¬ 
ful little house it was, too, with a red- 
tiled floor and a blue-tiled stove and pol¬ 
ished brass pans that gleamed on the 
walls. Just outside the window, the great 
arms of the windmill spun round and 
round in the breeze and nearly touched 
the ground as they whirled. 

Because company was coming, Mina and 
Nana were quite busy. While good Vrouw 
Van der Groote baked cakes that smelled 
spicy and delicious, the two smart little 
[ 60 ] 


Peter and the Windmill 



©Ewing Galloway 

MINA AND NANA LIVED IN A HOUSE THAT WAS BUILT 
RIGHT INTO THE BOTTOM OF A WINDMILL TOWER 


Dutch girls swept and dusted and 
scrubbed. 

Oh, how they did work! They scrubbed 
and polished the whole house. They 
scoured the tiles and the brasses, and all 
of the family’s wooden shoes. They even 

scrubbed Vetve, the pet gander that lived 

[ 61 ] 






Tambalo and Other Stories 
by the mill. Vetve squawked when they 
got soap in his eyes and flapped so out¬ 
rageously with his wings that this job 
took longest of all, and the twins just had 
time to scramble into their starchy, stiff, 
striped aprons and their tall lace caps be¬ 
fore the company arrived. 

Their guest’s name was Peter Vedder, 
and he was a little boy who had never 
lived in a house at all. His home was a 
boat, and he had traveled up and down 
most of the canals of Holland. But for all 
that Peter was “all dressed up” too, as you 
can see in the picture. 

Peter knew lots about boats and anchors 
and oars and such, but not much about 
land things. Maybe that’s why he had 
such a mix-up with the windmill. 

It all happened after dinner, when they 
were sitting out on the grass eating gin- 
[ 62 ] 


Peter and the Windmill 



©Ewing Galloway 

PETER VEDDER, WHOSE HOME WAS ON A BOAT 

gerbread. The long arms of the mill turn¬ 
ing lazily round and round seemed so fas¬ 
cinating to Peter, that the boy couldn’t 
resist jumping up and swinging onto one 
for a bit of a ride. He never meant to 
go far. But at that moment, a stiff wind 
swept in from across the Zuider Zee, and 

[ 63 ] 






Tambalo and Other Stories 

creakity-creak, the mill began to whirl 

rapidly. 

“Hai! You’ll be killed!” screamed the 
twins. “Quick, quick, turn loose!” 

But Peter was so scared, he forgot how 
to turn loose. 

Already his heels were above the twins’ 
heads, and the great mill arms were whirl¬ 
ing him higher, higher, when Mina leaped 
into the air and grabbed Peter by one 
ankle. Nana sprang up close behind her 
and grabbed the other ankle. And then 
“plump” they all dropped down to earth in 
the greatest tangle of arms and legs. 

When Peter finally got his breath, he 
sat up and said, “I was so foolish! I thank 
you for pulling me down.” 

“You’re very welcome,” said the twins 
politely. Then they all burst out laugh¬ 
ing. 


[ 64 ] 


Peter and the Windmill 

“How very funny you did look, hanging 
up there!” they giggled. 

“Well, I’m not going to look funny that 
way, any more,” announced Peter. 

“Oh me, oh my, we should hope not!” 
agreed the twins, trying not to laugh. 



[ 65 ] 







KATRINKA’S STAR 
The Meteor 

Katrinka Voost was one of the best 
little knitters in all Holland. Her long 
needles fairly twinkled as she “turned” a 
toe on a neat, gray stocking, which, with 
its mate, would bring, when finished, three 
quarter-guilders of Dutch money at Dame 
Poot’s shop in Gleeker town, eight miles 
away. 

But then, poor Katrinka had to knit so 
much, no wonder she could do it well. She 
and her mother, frail Vrouw Voost, lived 
in a little house stuck out amidst the bar¬ 
ren sand dunes near the sea. It was a 
tumble-down dwelling, with only paper 
for window panes, and scarcely any furni¬ 
ture at all. Katrinka’s home used to be 
[ 66 ] 


Katrinka’s Star 

much better, with a blue porcelain stove 
in the corner and gleaming silver-bright 
pewter plates set on the wall rack and 
rolls of ribbon-tied linen in the big chest. 
But now that Mother Voost was sick so 
much and not able to work as she used to 
do, all their pretty things had been sold to 
buy medicine for her and food for the two 
of them. 

Knit, knit, knit, clickety-clickety-click! 
Katrinka’s needles were forever flying in 
and out the gray woolen yarn. She was 
always ready to learn a new stitch. She 
tried so hard to earn enough, so they 
would not have to go begging for their 
food. 

There was not much else left in the 
house now, that was worth selling off; only 
Vrouw Voost’s festival dress that had been 
handed down in the family for genera- 
[ 67 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
tions. Vrouw Voost’s mother and her 
grandmother and her great-grandmother 
had all worn it. And Katrinka had 
thought that perhaps she, too, would wear 
it on festival occasions, when she was 
grown up. Very gorgeous it seemed to 
the little girl, with its trim, blue bodice, 
its full blue skirt embroidered to the knee, 
with its knitted mitts and lace cap and 
tucker of pure linen. 

But, if they were to have enough to eat, 
and the medicines Vrouw Voost needed to 
make her well, then the festival dress 
must be sold, too. And the time had come. 
Tomorrow it would have to be taken to 
town and bartered for necessities. 

So, on this night, Katrinka felt sad. The 
little girl slipped out of the house and 
went up to the top of the dyke to look 
at the stars. Somehow, the stars always 
[ 68 ] 



©Ezving Galloway 

KATRINKA WAS ALWAYS READY TO LEARN 
A NEW STITCH 




Tambalo and Other Stories 
comforted her. They were so bright and 
twinkly and cheerful, up there in the heav¬ 
ens. Katrinka whispered the little wishing 
verse to them: 

Star light, star bright, 

Wish I may, wish I might, 

Wish my wish come true tonight. 

She never really expected to have any 
of her star wishes come true. It was just 
a little game she often played, making 
believe that she could get all the things 
she wanted, health for her mother, enough 
to eat, pretty clothes, a nice home! 

“Oo-o-oh!” Katrinka ended her wishing 
with a little shriek. Something wonderful 
was happening up in the heavens. A 
great, gorgeous star with a flaring tail of 
fire shot across the sky. And it seemed 
to come straight through space towards 

[ 70 ] 


Katrinka’s Star 

Katrinka herself. It roared downward 
and disappeared. Katrinka was almost 
sure she heard it thud against the earth. 
She ran down the shore, but in the night 
she could find nothing. 

The next morning Katrinka was out 
early, searching again to see if she could 
find where the blazing star had fallen. 
Because this thing had occurred right 
after her star-wish, she had a queer feel¬ 
ing that maybe the star had brought a 
gift, after all. Folks sometimes laugh¬ 
ingly talked of the “pot of gold” at the 
foot of the rainbow. Might there not be 
a pot of gold where a star fell? 

She searched the sand barrens far and 
wide. At last she found—well, she found 
just a big lump of black stone lying in a 
great hollow of soft wet sand, as if it 
had landed on the earth with terrific force. 

[ 71 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
But there was no star gift, no pot of gold, 
nothing else at all. Only this ugly, black 
stone that had not been in the sand field 
before! Katrinka sat down by it and 
cried. She cried so hard that she did not 
see a tall man approaching. 

“Um, what’s this?” said the man. 

“It’s a fallen star, I think,” answered 
Katrinka, through her tears. “It wasn’t 
here yesterday. A blazing something fell 
out of the sky last night.” 

And then, because the man looked kind, 
Katrinka found herself telling him all 
about the sick mother and the festival 
dress that would have to be sold, and all 
about her game of wishing for things by 
the stars. And how she had hoped that 
the stars had answered her wish. 

“Um-m, well, well,” was all the man 
answered. 


[ 72 ] 


Katrinka’s Star 

He took a sharp instrument from his 
knapsack and poked about the stone with 
it. Then he sat down and told Katrinka 
some strange things. The black stone, he 
said, was a piece of a star that had bro¬ 
ken off and come whirling through space. 

Katrinka did not understand all that 
the man told her about the meteor, as he 
called the stone. But she did understand 
this much—that it was a very rare and 
precious something, and that the museum 
at Bedder would pay a big price for it. 

As Katrinka had been the first one to 
find the meteor, it was to her that the mu¬ 
seum actually paid a whole thousand guil¬ 
ders, money enough to buy all the things 
for which she had longed. And the festival 
dress would not have to be sold now. 

So it seemed, after all, that the stars 
had, in a way, answered her star-wish. 

[ 73 ] 


BERGETTA’S GEESE 
The Canals of Holland 

Bergetta Beekman lived up in Holland 
where there are canals running every 
way, and many, many bridges that have 
to be crossed if one goes anywhere at 
all. 

It was Bergetta’s duty to take her moth¬ 
er’s geese and cross Hinkle Winkle, the 
gander, out every day to the green grass 
of the far pasture. 

Very bad manners indeed had those 
Dutch geese! Bergetta was dreadfully 
ashamed of the way they lifted their wings 
and stuck out their heads and hissed 
loudly at everybody they met. 

One morning as she was driving her 
charges across the third canal, which is 
E 74 ] 



©Ewing Galloway 


BERGETTA AND THE GEESE 


















Tambalo and Other Stories 
the last one before you get to the pasture, 
she spied a cunning little girl sitting upon 
the high, middle part of the bridge. 

The naughty geese spied her, too. 

“K-s-s-s! K-s-s-s!” they hissed and ran 
straight at her with their mouths wide 
open. 

Oh, my! but the little stranger was 
scared! She screamed and fell right off 
the planking backwards into the shallow 
water beneath. 

The geese haughtily stalked on their 
way, and began eating grass as calmly 
as if nothing in the world had happened. 
But Bergetta ran to the canal edge, lay 
flat on her stomach, and reached out both 
hands to help pull the little girl out of 
the water. 

“O-o-oh!” chattered the stranger, as 
she stood dripping canal water all over 

[76] 


Bergetta 9 s Geese 

the grass, “I’ll f-freeze to death b-before 
I can ever g-g-get home! O-o-oh! O-o-oh!” 

“No, you won’t,” said Bergetta. “Run 
fast, and stamp your feet hard as you 
run.” 

“But please,” she called after the little 
stranger, as she started to run away, 
“come back and talk to me.” 

After an hour or so the little girl came 
back in clean, dry clothes. 

“I am so glad that I fell into the water, 
because now I know you,” she said to Ber¬ 
getta. “Do come and play with me at my 
house. And, oh, yes, my name’s Marzana. 
What’s yours?” 

“Mine’s Bergetta,” answered the goose 
girl. 

“Well, come soon,” called back Mar¬ 
zana over her shoulder. “I’ve got a mon¬ 
key that my sailor uncle brought me from 

[77] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

the Indies, and a funny doll from China. 

Can you come today?” 

“Oh, my, yes!” shrieked the goose girl 
excitedly. 

As Bergetta drove her charges home, 
this once she did not have the heart to 
scold them for their shockingly bad man¬ 
ners, because, you see, they had helped 
her find a new friend. And friends are 
lovely things to have. 


[ 78 ] 


THREE LITTLE VAN NEIFS 
The Milk Cart 

It was such fun to be triplets! Anyway, 
that was what the Van Neif triplets, Yoda 
and Hans and Jacobina, thought. There 
were always three of them just the same 
age, to play jolly games together, and to 
work together, too. 

Papa Van Neif had a neat little farm 
outside of the thrifty little Dutch town 
of Groningen. He was a fine farmer, and 
he raised cabbages almost as big as Yoda, 
and pumpkins as big as Jacobina. And 
his cows gave milk enough to fill a brass 
can twice as big as Hans. Every day 
Papa Van Neif hitched up Drenky, his 
faithful dog, to the little red cart, set the 
shining brass can of milk aboard, and 
[79] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
away they went, Drenky pulling and he 
pushing. The farmer sold his produce in 
town to the mothers with little children 
and babies. They were glad to get his 
fresh milk, so pure and wholesome. 

But one day on the way home Papa Van 
Neif and his good dog, Drenky, got hurt 
by a runaway horse. They were both so 
injured that they had to rest for a day. 

The morning after the accident, Vrouw 
Van Neif milked all of the cows. And to 
cheer up her husband, she said : “Don’t 
worry. Not a thing shall be wasted. I’ll 
make every bit of the milk into fine butter 
and curds and round cheeses.” 

But Papa Van Neif did worry. “Think 
of the babies!” he groaned. “They’ll miss 
their good, fresh milk!” 

“Oh, my, the babies!” exclaimed Vrouw 
Van Neif. 


[ 80 ] 


PAPA VAN NEIF AND DRENKY, HIS FAITHFUL DOG 





#*}; 













Tambalo and Other Stories 

“Yes, yes, the poor hungry babies!” 
echoed the Van Neif triplets from their 
corner, where they were polishing the Van 
Neif pewter plates, the mugs and bowls. 

For a long minute the children sat very 
still and thoughtful. Suddenly Hans whis¬ 
pered excitedly, “The cart’s not heavy and 
I’m strong. Don’t you think we could do 
it, if I pulled hard?” 

“And if I pulled, too!” said Jacobina, 
nodding her head till her pretty little 
cap nearly bounced off. 

“And if I pushed and pushed! Of course 
we could do it,” finished Yoda, setting 
aside the pewter. 

The three of them ran to Mother Van 
Neif and told her of their plan. At first 
she said, “No. You are too little.” But 
the children pleaded hard and at last she 
agreed to let them try. 

182 ] 


Three Little Van Neifs 
So, with much huffing and puffing, 
Mother Van Neif lifted the big can of 
milk up to its place in the red cart. Hans 
and Jacobina slipped into the harness in 
front. Yoda pushed behind. And away 
they went, hauling the load to town. 

It was hard work! The road seemed 
to stretch away forever. Glidden Hill, 
that wound up by the church, seemed 
steeper than ever before. But the sturdy 
little Van Neifs pulled and pushed and 
pushed and pulled, • and finally they got 
their cartload of milk to town. Here they 
stopped at houses up and down the street. 
Yoda and Jacobina carefully measured the 
fresh, sweet milk into quart cups and pint 
cups, and Hans delivered these to the wait¬ 
ing housevrouws. So, after all, the babies 
of Groningen did not have to go hungry. 
And Papa Van Neif was happy, too! 

[83] 


BIANCHI AND LITTLE BROWN 
BEPPO 

The Mischievous Monkey 

Bianchi, with her little brother, Paolo 
Nicolo, cuddled close, sat on the bottom 
step of their tall, shabby, tenement home, 
and gazed out across the sea. 

Soon Bianchi, who was a capable young 
housekeeper of seven summers, must 
climb the six long flights of stairs to see 
if Teresa, their little sister, slept, and also 
to start mixing the stew of little onions 
and big peppers and oil and fish. Always 
the smart Bianchi had supper, well cooked 
and piping hot, waiting for Mother Giu- 
seppa’s return from work. 

For a few moments the Italian girl 
lingered on to dream and to gaze across 

[84] 


Bianchi and Little Brown Beppo 

the waters. Her home was on one of those 
narrow, old, cobble-stoned streets of New 
York that lead right down to New York 
harbor. From her doorstep she could 
watch the big ships come and go, ships 
from ail the ports of the world. 

On one of these great steamers, Bianchi 
herself had come from sunny Italy to 
America. That had been one, two, three, 
four, five whole years ago, long before 
Teresa, or even curly-headed Paolo had 
been born. And how funny were the 
clothes she and her parents had worn to 
America! Mother Giuseppa had been ar¬ 
rayed in a black bodice and many full- 
gathered skirts, with a great, fringed 
shawl over her head. Wee Bianchi had 
been dressed in bodice and shawl, too. 
And as for Papa Felipe! He had worn 
boots and mustachios and great, golden 

[85] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
hoops of earrings in his ears. Along with 
their bundles of clothing had come some¬ 
thing else—their pet monkey, little brown 
Beppo. 

And now, in the five years that had 
passed, Bianchi had grown big enough 
and smart enough to cook meals and to 
keep house. And little brown Beppo, the 
monkey, had grown rather old and gray- 
whiskered. 

On this day a great Norwegian ship 
was steaming out with all bands playing. 
Bianchi, watching from her doorstone, 
leaped to her feet and lifted Paolo in her 
arms to catch the last glimpse of the thou¬ 
sand banners, red and white, that flut¬ 
tered over the boat. It was beautiful, 
beautiful! But—what was that? Bianchi 
threw up her head and listened. 

Screams, frightened screams, were 
[ 86 ] 



LITTLE BROWN BEPPO 


©Ewing Galloway 





Tambalo and Other Stories 

sounding through the house behind her. 

It was Teresa, Baby Teresa! What had 
happened? Had she fallen? Was it fire? 
A terrified Bianchi raced up the many 
stairs, with an equally terrified Paolo at 
her heels. 

As Bianchi flung wide their door, 
a strange sight greeted them. In her 
crib Baby Teresa was squealing with 
fright and huddling in its corner. While 
over the floor, bang, bang! clatter, clat¬ 
ter! a tall tin bucket, turned upside down, 
was galloping madly back and forth. 

Caro mio! the thing seemed alive. Who 
ever heard of a bucket running? In her 
fright, Bianchi almost slammed the door 
tight between herself and the scampering 
bucket. 

Then, quite as suddenly, she remem¬ 
bered poor, scared Teresa. She must res- 

[ 88 ] 


Bianchi and Little Brown Beppo 
cue her! Bravely Bianchi dashed for the 
crib. Bangity-bang! Right behind her 
came the bucket. Out flew Bianchi’s sturdy 
foot, giving the crazy thing a whack. 
Over it turned, and—what do you think 
hopped out? 

Why, little brown Beppo, the monkey! 

In a moment, Bianchi saw how it all had 
happened. The bucket was only the tin 
pail that always stood on the shelf with 
little cakes in it. And Beppo, greedy 
little wretch, must have reached in a paw, 
toppled the bucket over on himself, and 
then could not get from under it. 

Now that it was all over, how Bianchi 
did laugh! She laughed so she could hardly 
fix the little onions and the big peppers 
for the stew. Wouldn’t she have a funny 
tale to tell Mama Giuseppa and Papa 
Felipe when they came home to supper! 

[89] 


YUMA KAX 
An Aztec Prince 

Once upon a time 
Very, very long ago 
There lived a little 
Aztec prince in old, old Mexico. 



Upon the high, high mountain 
Of Popocatepetl 

Lived Yuma Kax, His Highness. 
Here’s how his name he spelt. 


cr 

c 

cL 


‘PUP 


[ 90 } 
























Yuma Kax 


To school went little Yuma Kax, 

He went to study, you see, 

But the arithmetic he learned there 
Was queer as queer could be. 


o 

= 1 

o o 

= 2 

ooo 

= 3 

o o o o 

= 4 

l L - 9 

*3 


And when it rained little Yuma thought 
An old woman up in the sky 
Turned a great big water jar over, 

And let the waters fly. 



[ 91 ] 

















©Underwood and Underwood 

O-KEE-TA-WA WITH HER FATHER AND LITTLE 
BROTHER AT THE DOOR OF THEIR HOME 

O-KEE-TA-WA, THE SHY ONE 
An Indian Story 

O-kee-ta-wa was round and brown and 
plump, with soft dark eyes and lots of 
black hair. On special occasions, she 
adorned her small person with great 
bracelets of hammered silver and two blue 

r 921 







O-kee-ta-wa, the Shy One 
earrings and a long, looped-up necklace 
of lava stones. You can see part of the 
necklace, as she stands with her father 
and little brother, in the door of their little 
home. 

She lived out on our own far western 
plains, in a queer sort of house built of 
mud and rock, called a pueblo. It was 
three stories high and all the Indians of 
Eagle Village lived in this one building. 
There were many children in the pueblo. 
They had a great time chasing each other 
up and down the entrance ladders, and 
playing games on the big, flat, pueblo roof. 
O-kee-ta-wa could have had much fun 
with so many playmates, if only she had 
not been so dreadfully shy. As it was, 
though, whenever she saw Bright Moon 
or Georgie Spotted Fox, or any of the 
other little Indians coming for a romp, 

f 93 } 



©Ewing Galloway 

ALL THE INDIANS LIVED IN THIS ONE BUILDING 






O-kee-ta-wa, the Shy One 
the timid O-kee-ta-wa always ran and hid. 

One day she went to the big, strange 
city of Roua Hala. It was a long, long 
journey across the sand plains. O-kee- 
ta-wa made the trip perched behind Whirl¬ 
ing Thunder, her father, on his white 
burro. Her older sister, Junana, and old 
Keta, the basket woman, and many other 
Indians would travel in the party, too. 
They were all going to the “white man’s 
city” to sell things, beautifully woven 
baskets, pottery and blankets, and fine 
jewelry made of lava stone. In the city, 
the Indian traders had good luck. By the 
time the sun reached the top of the sky, 
they had sold all their wares; that is, 
everybody except old Keta. The basket 
woman had been taken sick. 

And so kind-hearted Junana decided to 
do what she could to sell the baskets for 

[ 95 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 



© Underwood and Underwood 

OLD KETA, THE BASKET WOMAN 

her. The Indian girl had thought up a 
splendid scheme, if only her little sister 
would help her. However, when told what 
her work in selling the baskets would be, 
the timid child hung her head. 

“Oh, I couldn’t, Junana, I couldn’t!” she 
wailed. 


[ 96 ] 





O-kee-ta-wa , the Shy One 


©Underwood, and Underwood 

THE BASKET WOMAN HAD BEEN TAKEN SICK 

“Ya, silly little shy one,” chided Junana, 
“don’t forget that old Keta is always giv¬ 
ing you grass-seed cakes and sweet pinon 
nuts. You could help her now, if you just 
would. Stop thinking of yourself all the 
time and think of somebody else, then 
you won’t be so timid.” 

“I—I’ll try,” stammered O-kee-ta-wa. 

[ 97 ] 






Tambalo and Other Stories 
And before she had a chance to change 
her mind, her tall sister picked her up 
and plumped her down into the biggest 
and handsomest basket. , 

You see, Junana wisely judged that so 
picturesque a maid as wee O-kee-ta-wa, 
perched in one of the varicolored baskets, 
would attract attention and bring cus¬ 
tomers. 

The plan worked, too; for at once a 
slender, blonde lady stopped and bought 
the very basket O-kee-ta-wa was standing 
in. After she passed on, Junano lifted 
O-kee-ta-wa into another of the big bas¬ 
kets, and soon it was sold also. Folks 
just could not seem to resist the combined 
charm of Indian maid and Indian basket. 
By the time the round, red sun had 
dropped down to the horizon, all of old 
Keta’s wares were sold. 

[ 98 ] 



©Ewing Galloway 

JUNANA PLUMPED O-KEE-TA-WA INTO THE BASKET 









Tambalo and Other Stories 

The best part was that O-kee-ta-wa had 
learned not to be shy. She had found 
out, sure enough, that one does not have 
any time left in which to be timid, if one 
just thinks of other folks instead of one¬ 
self. 

After that, O-kee-ta-wa had as much 
fun as anybody, romping through queer 
Indian games around the mud chimneys 
of the big pueblo roof. 


[ 100 ] 


YUNI AND THE MOKSA 
In Far-away Korea 

Yuni was a cunning, little, black-eyed 
girl who lived in far-away Korea. Her 
home had smoothly plastered walls of 
mud, a straw-thatched roof, and a floor 
covered with thick, yellow paper. The 
doors and windows were of paper, too, 
so the roof projected over them for three 
feet or more to protect them from the 
rain. 

Whenever Yuni was naughty or wanted 
to run away and see the big, wide world 
beyond the high-walled courtyard of her 
home, Arun, her nurse, would frighten her 
by saying: 

“Have a care, or the Moksa will get 
you. And when she does, she will shut 
[ 101 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

you up in a big house with glass windows 

and make you work.” 

Then Yuni would shiver and look over 
her shoulder in a fright. She was terribly 
afraid of this person called the Moksa, 
whom she had never seen. 

But this day Yuni was lonesome. Her 
mother and Arun and Big Sister Kaundi 
had gone to the pool to wash the linen. 
Yuni was too young for this kind of work, 
so she was left behind. The little girl sat 
out in the sunshine sewing strips of cloth 
together. The strips were very narrow 
and were in all sorts of lovely, gay colors. 
When Yuni finished her task she would 
have a splendid pair of striped sleeves to 
wear with her best jacket. No little girl 
in Korea feels “all dressed up” unless she 
has on rainbow sleeves. 

But Yuni got more and more lonesome. 

[ 102 ] 


Yuni and the Moksa 

It was very tiresome just to sit and sew 
by herself. And anyway the needle kept 
pricking her finger. Finally, she decided 
to open the courtyard gate a wee bit and 
peek out. 

How fine and exciting it was on the 
street! Here came a string of sturdy 
ponies, laden with great sacks of barley. 
Further on was a coolie, singing gaily as 
he trotted along with his jiky, or carry¬ 
ing frame, strapped to his back, and piled 
high with household goods. Best of all 
was the Korean carriage that came swiftly 
into view. It was a funny, boxlike affair, 
with a four-posted canopy top, and it was 
borne by four men. Sitting inside was a 
lady arrayed in an embroidered robe and 
many jewels. 

Before she stopped to think, Yuni 
slipped through the gate and went flying 
[ 103 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
down the street after the carriage. She 
did so want to get another glimpse of the 
beautiful lady behind the swaying cur¬ 
tains! On and on she ran, but never 
got very near; for the four runners went 
swiftly, and finally the carriage was lost 
to sight in the confusion of the market 
place. The little girl had never been to 
chang-nai (market) before and she found 
it very thrilling. Everywhere were straw- 
covered booths. Pigs squealed, cows lowed, 
chickens squawked, and men were shout¬ 
ing for people to come and buy their 
wares. Very tempting were the stands of 
barley cakes and rice balls and kim-chi 
(pickled cabbage). 

But Yuni had no money to spend for 
any of these delightful things, so she wan¬ 
dered on past the market. At last, down 
a side street, she came upon the queerest 

[ 104 ] 


Yuni and the Moksa 
place she had ever seen. It was a house, 
but instead of being built of straw and 
mud, as were all the houses she knew 
anything about, it was built of wood. The 
door was open and Yuni slipped inside. 
Then she stopped short. Before her, rows 
and rows of little girls sat cross-legged 
on the floor. They all had books in their 
hands and they were all saying something 
out loud together. 

Yuni stared about her. It was a great, 
light room; the windows were all of glass. 
And here came a tall woman with curious 
clothes and queer, yellow hair. Ai! dread¬ 
ful! It must be the Moksa —and she was 
coming to catch her! 

Yuni screamed aloud; then she darted 
out of the door and ran. Down the street 
she went, on and on; until at last she 
came to her own dear home. Through 

[ 105 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

the gate she ran and scuttled straight into 

her mother’s arms. 

When finally she caught her breath and 
stopped sobbing, she told her mother all 
about what a naughty girl she had been 
to run away and how she had been pun¬ 
ished by having the Moksa nearly catch 
her. 

“The Moksal” said the mother in sur¬ 
prise. “Who is this Moksa that Arun has 
been telling you tales about and scaring 
you?” 

“Fa,” spoke up Arun, hanging her head 
a bit, “I meant no harm. It is the queer, 
pale-faced woman who lives in the house 
made of wood and who teaches strange 
things. Folks call her the white Moksa 
(teacher).” 

“Hai!” exclaimed Yuni’s mother. “Come 
to think of it, I have heard of this white 
[ 106 ] 











Tambalo and Other Stories 
Moksa! But only good things have I 
heard. And now, little Yuni, if you will 
be good and promise never to run away 
again, tomorrow I will take you to visit 
the white teacher who lives in the big 
house. And perhaps she will let us taste 
some of the queer, delicious sweets folks 
say she gets from her own far-away land.” 

So the very next day an excited little 
girl, clinging to her mother’s hand, paid 
a real visit to the Moksa. And this time 
it was a delightful visit. For the kind 
Moksa (an American woman who had 
come to Korea to teach), gave her cookies 
and candies and taught her how to play 
merry games with the happy school girls 
at the big school building. 


[ 108 ] 


WO NI TA 

The Peking Language School 

It certainly was a queer kind of school. 
All of the scholars were Americans, and 
all of them, except one, were grown men 
and women. These pupils were ranged 
in long, prim rows across a long, prim 
room, while upon a raised platform at one 
end, two courtly Chinese teachers presided 
over the assemblage. 

This was the Peking Language School, 
and these were teachers who had come to 
China to teach in the Chinese schools, 
having their training in the Chinese lan¬ 
guage. 

Mary Elizabeth wasn’t a teacher, but 
she was the daughter of one, so she was 
having a course at the school, too. 

[ 109 } 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

Mary Elizabeth spent many days sight¬ 
seeing in the vast, old city with its crooked, 
crowded streets, full of rickshaws and 
vendors and coolies who chanted musi¬ 
cally as they trotted along under their 
burdens. One place especially, that she 
had visited, made her positively wild to 
learn some Chinese words. This was the 
little hospital across the block that faced 
on the Street of Towers. Here, sitting or 
lying in their cribs, were rows upon rows 
of little children. Some of the little 
patients had injured their legs or their 
feet or their fingers, and there were some 
with so many bandages that their little 
persons were scarcely visible. 

They tried to smile and to reach thin 
little hands between the bars of the cribs 
to touch Mary Elizabeth’s “so different” 
American dress. They were pathetically 
[ 110 ] 


Wo Ni Ta 

pleased with the slightest little attention 
and Mary Elizabeth felt very sad because 
she could not say a single comforting 
word that could be understood. Then there 
were the little ones who were almost well 
and who were up and dressed. 

So the next day, here she was at the 
School of Language, excited and eager 
over her first lesson in Chinese. 

“Wo ni ta,” slowly declaimed the cere¬ 
monious Chinese head teacher. As he 
chanted the syllables, he pointed in turn 
to his own nose, to the noses of the pupils 
and to the nose of the assistant teacher. 
Over and over, this performance was re¬ 
peated, the pupils’ part being simply to sit 
and listen, and train their ears to the un¬ 
familiar sounds. 

Almost before they knew it, the first 
lesson was over. 


[ill] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 



©Underwood and Underwood 

THE LITTLE ONES WHO WERE ALMOST WELL AND WHO 
WERE UP AND DRESSED 

“Wo ni ta, wo ni ta,” softly sang Mary 
Elizabeth under her breath, as she went 
through the quaint, formal garden to her 
new home in the mission compound. 
“Mother, Dad!” she cried excitedly, as 

she burst into the room. “May I go back 
[ 112 ] 








Wo Ni Ta 

to the hospital this afternoon? I remem¬ 
ber the cunningest little black-haired girl 
with slanty eyes and a poor little broken 
nose. And just think, I’ve already learned 
the Chinese for nose! I can say it, and 
she’ll understand that I know what’s the 
trouble and feel sorry for her. 

“Wo ni ta —nose,” said Mary Elizabeth 
proudly, and she pointed to her own ador¬ 
able little turned-up nose and to Mother 
and to Dad. That was the way the teacher 
had done when he said, “Wo ni ta” 

“Wo ni ta —nose?” said Dad, looking 
very blank. “Wo ni ta —nose?” Then he 
laughed and laughed. 

Then, because Mary Elizabeth looked 
and felt quite indignant, he cuddled her 
up close on his knee and explained the 
joke. 

“Wo ni ta” didn’t mean nose at all. It 

[ 113 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
meant “I, you, he.” The teacher had 
meant to indicate this by pointing to him¬ 
self, “I,” to the pupils, “you,” and to the 
assistant, “he.” However, Chinese fash¬ 
ion, he had pointed directly to the nose, 
instead of, American fashion, making a 
gesture inclusive of the whole person. 

Mary Elizabeth did get her afternoon’s 
visit to the hospital, after all. Dad care¬ 
fully drilled her in the Chinese words for 
“How are you?” So, when she walked 
through the long ward, she had something 
to say to every little patient, instead of 
just to the girlie with the injured nose. 

Luckily, Mary Elizabeth didn’t let her 
comical first mistake daunt her. The next 
day, and the next, and many other days, 
she was back at the School of Language, 
diligently trying to learn the queer sound¬ 
ing words and sentences. 

[ 114 ] 


Wo Ni Ta 

At last came the exciting day when 
she had her first reading lesson in the 
most imposing “Mandarin Primer.” By 
Christmas, she could do a bit of the 
perfectly fascinating character-writing. 
When spring rolled around again, Mary 
Elizabeth was thrilled to find that she 
could really tell some stories in Chinese. 

Her little friends in the hospital ward 
were thrilled over this story-telling, too. 
But sometimes they had a breathless wait, 
right in the midst of a tale, while Mary 
Elizabeth dashed desperately through her 
Chinese-English dictionary on the trail of 
a lost word. 


[ 115 ] 


WHEN AH LOO THOUGHT QUICKLY 
A Story of Little Chinese Folk 

Ah Loo, the little Chinese girl, and her 
baby brother, Ah Sung, had lived always 
in a queer, floating city. This city was 
made of boats, hundreds of them, moored 
along the banks of the river Chung-zu, 
just where it flows into the sea. Upon 
each boat an archway of bent cane cov¬ 
ered with a roof of closely woven matting 
formed a snug little cabin for a family to 
live in. Sometimes, in the latticed stern, 
hens clucked and cackled and scratched 
about a sheaf of rice straw. 

There were plenty of children in the 
floating city, and all the toddlers wore bits 
of rope tied about the waist, so that if 
they fell overboard they could be quickly 
[ 116 ] 


When Ah Loo Thought Quickly 



©Underwood and Underwood 


THE QUEER FLOATING CITY 

hooked up out of the water. I am sure 
that would seem queer to most of us. 

The houseboat that was Ah Loo’s home 
did not always stay tied up at the river 
bank. Sometimes Father Ah made trips 
up and downstream carrying passengers. 
And again, he anchored his boat out in 
the farming district and worked in the 
rice fields. 

Ah Loo liked it out in the country amid 
[ 117 ] 










Tambalo and Other Stories 

the great stretches of young rice and 

the fields of striped sugar cane and the 

mingled green and gold of the orange 

groves. 

Because she was a strong, happy, big¬ 
footed little girl, Ah Loo could work just 
as well as any boy. Sometimes she went 
ashore with her basket and her bamboo 
rake to scrape up leaves and twigs for 
fuel. Sometimes at farms, she helped 
at husking the rice. This was fun. She 
jumped up and down on one end of a 
long board so that the other end thumped 
into a great basin and pounded the husks 
off the rice. 

When the houseboat was anchored near 
some city, Ah Loo helped Mother Ah sell 
fish and little packets of cooked rice 
neatly wrapped in green leaves. 

Altogether, she led a busy, happy life. 

[ 118 ] 



©Ewing Galloway 

AH LOO HAD TO CARRY AH SUNG ON HER BACK 




Tambalo and Other Stories 

At least, she was happy until the baby 
came. After that, life seemed dark and 
gloomy. For, you see, Ah Loo had to carry 
Ah Sung on her back. For months, every¬ 
where Ah Loo went, baby had to go, too. 
Oh, my, how heavy he grew! Sometimes 
Ah Loo’s back ached so, it wasn’t any fun 
to play “fox and geese,” or any of the 
other games. At times she almost wished 
she didn’t have any little brother. 

Then, one day, something happened. 
Ah Sung, who was crawling about the 
deck, fell into the water. Not overboard 
into the river, but into the big water jar 
that stands in the stern, fell Ah Sung. 
He was such a spry, sturdy baby, that he 
had gone, creeping, creeping up some rolls 
of matting and then, next thing, into the 
jar he had tumbled! 

Ah Loo tugged and screamed, but she 
[ 120 ] 


When Ah Loo Thought Quickly 
could not fish him out. He was too heavy. 
And right then Ah Loo knew how much 
she did love her baby brother. How dread¬ 
ful it would be to lose him! Quick as a 
flash the little Chinese girl did a very 
clever thing. She grabbed an iron boat¬ 
hook and beat it against the side of the 
jar with all her might until she cracked 
a big hole in it and let all the water out. 
So Ah Sung was saved. 

And never again after that did Ah Loo 
complain about having to carry around 
the cunning, plump little youngster. For 
when she realized how much she loved 
him, he did not seem a burden any more. 


[ 121 ] 


LITTLE ESKIMO A-TAQ AND THE 
MOON STORY 
A Home in Greenland 

Little Eskimo A-taq lived away up north 
in a very cold place, that great Arctic 
island called Greenland. Her mother was 
called Ukua (the sea), because she was 
born near the sea. Her father’s name 
was Nakivat (the strong one), because he 
was strong enough to hunt the seal and 
the white bear and the shaggy musk ox. 
A-taq’s own name meant “little white 
duck,” because she was so little and fair 
for an Eskimo baby. 

A-taq’s home was a funny, round-topped 
stone hut. It was a small, cozy place, 
though, with plenty of fur rugs to sit 
upon and with a curious, flat stone lamp 
[ 122 ] 


NAKIVAT WAS STRONG ENOUGH TO HUNT THE SEAL 





Tambalo and Other Stories 

filled with seal oil to give light and heat. 

This was the time of the “long day” 
in A-taq’s land. Now the sun shone by 
day and by night for four whole months. 
This was a hard season on the Eskimos. 
For the bright sunlight on the white snow 
sometimes made people snow-blind, if they 
ventured too far from home and stayed 
out very long in the glare. And if folks 
didn’t have plenty of food stored up in an 
ice cave to last them through the long 
day of many months, they would be in 
great danger of starving. 

However, Nakivat, the Strong One, had 
wisely packed away many dried fish and 
much frozen meat for his family. So there 
was no danger of A-taq going hungry. 

But, ai-he! How tired the little girl 
did get of sitting, sitting, sitting, all the 
long time within the stone hut. It was 

[ 124 } 


Little Eskimo A-taq and the Moon Story 
much too small a house for her to romp 
and play in. So she was forever asking 
her mother to tell her stories. And here’s 
the story A-taq loved best of all. 

“Once upon a time,” began Ukua, “a 
man made a trip to the moon. This one’s 
name was Shama, and he went on this 
journey in a strange way. He fell into a 
deep sleep and made a dream trip to the 
moon. In spirit, he sailed away through 
the air, across the land and the sea to 
the place where the earth and sky meet. 
Then he went up, up into the sky, right 
to where the moon is. And there he found 
—what do you think?” 

“Oh—oh, I know!” cried A-taq, clap¬ 
ping her hands, “he found the house of 
the old man in the moon.” 

“Yes,” went on Ukua, “he found the 
house where dwelt the old, old man of 

[ 125 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
the moon. It was a big igloo, the biggest 
ever seen, all round and made of snow. 
On top of the igloo sat the moon’s dog to 
watch and bark and let him know when 
strangers came. The old man of the moon 
sits always by a hole in his igloo floor, 
so he can look down on earth and see 
what the man-people are doing there. In 
the middle of the moon man’s house is a 
lake, wide and deep and stretching so 
far that its edges are lost in the dark. 
From the lake, the old man turns on all 
the rain that falls on earth.” 

And that’s the end of the moon story. 
And that’s what little Eskimo A-taq be¬ 
lieves about the rain and where it comes 
from. 


[ 126 ] 



LONG CHONG, SHORT CHONG 
The Little “Looking-Glasses” 

Wu Chong was a cunning little Chinese 
boy, as fat as butter and as yellow as a 
pumpkin. His clothes were quite mar¬ 
velous. On dress-up occasions he always 
wore an embroidered blue jacket, mauve- 
colored trousers, and red slippers with 
cat faces embroidered on the toes. His 
mother said the little bewhiskered faces 
were to make him as sure-footed as the 
cat. 

Chong’s home was next door to that of 
an American family living in this Chinese 
city, and Mother Wu was fond of the 
American lady. So, just to be friendly 
with this neighbor, she used to send her 
little son over there once a week to polish 

[ 127 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

spoons and silverware for the American 

lady. 

At first, Chong being a wee bit lazy, he 
didn’t like to do it, even if the lady always 
did give him sugar cookies. 

Then one day he found out something 
that made the job seem like play. After 
he had polished a spoon, he would hold 
it up and look at it, then laugh till he 
nearly popped out of his blue jacket. The 
honorable lady from America heard him 
having such a good time in the kitchen, 
that she went back to find out what it was 
all about. 

“Ho, ho, ho, I’m making little looking- 
glasses!” shouted Chong gleefully, as he 
held up a shining, polished spoon. “See! 
long Chong this way; short Chong that 
way!” 

Sure enough, when he held up the spoon 
[ 128 ] 


Long Chong , Short Chong 



©Underwood and Underwood 

CHONG LAUGHED AS HE TOLD HIS PLAYMATES ABOUT 
THE LITTLE “LOOKING GLASSES” 

lengthwise and peered into its bowl, there 
was reflected such a funny Wu Chong, 
very thin and very mournful. When he 
turned the spoon sideways, there ap¬ 
peared a roly-poly Wu Chong with very 
fat cheeks and mouth and nose! 

“Chong like to polish, him come twice 

[ 129 ] 



Tambalo and Other Stories 
a week all time now,” said the little boy, 
as he cheerfully rubbed up the last spoon 
and accepted as pay, a big round sugar 
cooky. “Little looking-glass, him lots of 
fun!” 

And Chong laughed again as he told his 
playmates about the little looking-glasses 
and the fun he had holding them up to 
see “long Chong” and “short Chong.” 


YANO AND THE DRAGON WAGON 
The Fighting Gander 

One by one, from the little thatch-roofed 
cottage in which she lived, Yano brought 
the big straw mats, and spread them along 
the roadside where the sunshine was the 
brightest. 

Yano had on her everyday pants of in¬ 
digo calico, for in China, girls wear pants 
and boys wear skirts, and her black hair 
was plaited in two little “pigtails” that 
bobbed up and down as she trotted along. 

Mo-chin (Mother Beloved), the Honor¬ 
able Father and Big Brother were at work 
in the rice fields harvesting rice. Yano 
was too small to help there. But later on, 
when harvest time came, she did help. The 
rice was brought in, and the baskets were 

[ 131 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
emptied on the mats. Then Yano spread 
the grains evenly, so they would dry 
quickly in the hot sun, and could be stored 
away for winter food. 

It was her task also to drive away the 
ducks and chickens that came with much 
quacking and cackling from old Li Chi’s 
bullock pen across the road. With a long 
bamboo cane she put the hens to flight; 
but it was only with hard work that she 
kept off the waddling ducks, who, with 
much clap-clapping of yellow bills, just 
would make dashes for the rice mats and 
scoop up many a mouthful. 

“Ho! Thou gray pest! Shoo!” shouted 
the exasperated Yano, as she landed a 
well-aimed whack on the thieving old 
drake’s back that sent him and his fam¬ 
ily scurrying out on the road. 

After an exciting race, the fleeing 

[ 132 ] 


©Ewing Galloway 

THE MOTHER, FATHER AND BIG BROTHER WERE AT WORK IN THE RICE FIELD 







•r > 




mam 

•x v .V.r :•;< • > 




mi' 


\ 5 '■ 


5 . 


v 












Tambalo and Other Stories 

ducks, with Yano close behind them, were 

at last herded into their master’s pasture. 

But my—my! What was it now? The 
little girl, pausing to listen, recognized the 
honk-honk of neighbor Wang’s flock of 
geese. Chickens and ducks were bad 
enough, but geese! Why, geese would eat 
up all the rice on a mat before she could 
get there! Hail Yai! She must run for 
home as fast as her legs could carry her! 

The geese had not yet reached the rice, 
but Yano’s heart went pit-a-pat when she 
saw the big, brown gander, the terror of 
the village children, leading the flock. 

With fear and trembling she brandished 
her cane and tried to drive them away; 
but the gander, with outstretched neck 
and flapping wings, was ready to do bat¬ 
tle. Hissing and snapping, he ran at her, 
and caught hold of the calico trousers 

[ 134 ] 


Yano and the Dragon Wagon 
and, with a vicious jerk, tore a great rent. 

Kicking and yelling and knocking right 
and left with her cane, little Yano de¬ 
fended herself bravely, and was about to 
rout the gander, when, with much snort¬ 
ing and tooting, an evil-smelling monster 
stopped in the road. From the inside of 
this dragon-wagon a white man wearing 
pants like a woman jumped out. He was 
followed by a girl with a white face and 
fluffy, yellow curls, arrayed in skirts. 

This was more than poor Yano could 
stand. With a screech of terror she 
dashed into thfe house. 

It was the first automobile that had ever 
come to the Chinese village, and the Amer¬ 
ican and his daughter were the first white 
people Yano had set eyes on; so you can 
hardly blame her for thinking the car a 
terrible dragon, like the one the Honor- 

[ 135 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
able Grandmother told her lived under the 
mountain, and that these strange white 
ones were come to carry her off to some 
goblin place beneath the earth. 

Ai! How scared little Yano was! The 
honorable rice on the mats was all forgot¬ 
ten. 

Into the house and behind the shelter 
of a red screen she hustled. However, 
when she fearfully peeped out, to her sur¬ 
prise, she saw that the folks from the 
chug-chugging black dragon on wheels, 
instead of coming to hunt her, were help¬ 
ing her. 

“Shoo-shoo-shoo, you!” yelled the man. 

“Shoo-shoo, you!” echoed the little, 
strange, yellow-haired child, hopping 
nimbly about and helping drive off the old 
brown gander and his wives. 

After such kindness, little Yano took 
r 136] 


Yano and the Dragon Wagon 
heart and came out—came out very shyly, 
to be sure, but she came. 

And thus it was that Yano met the good 
American doctor and his, little girl. 

Many times after that the doctor’s au¬ 
tomobile came through the valley of the 
rice fields. Sometimes the little blonde 
girl brought Yano pretty pictures, or 
pieces of foreign candy, or a queer doll. 
And Yano, out of her small world, gave 
gifts in return—a clay rooster that she 
herself had molded, with a real feather 
set in for a tail, and a tiny, woven reed 
basket full of waxy candle berries gath¬ 
ered on the mountain side. 

So, after all, the old fighting gander 
brought Yano some dear, dear friends. 


[ 137 ] 


“THE HONORABLE LITTLE 
GENTLEMEN” 

A Story of Silk Worms 

It was late on a bright moonlight night 
in August. Tu San, the small Japanese 
girl, was both sleepy and tired. Since 
early morning, she had been busy help¬ 
ing her mother and father carry in the 
baskets of mulberry leaves for the “hon¬ 
orable . little gentlemen” to eat. Great 
trays, strewn with leaves and arranged 
in tiers, filled every crack and corner of 
the house. From the trays came a sound 
of ceaseless nibbling that made one think 
of a thousand pens scratching away on 
paper. 

These nibblers were 0 ko sama, the 
honorable little gentlemen, as the Jap- 

[ 138 ] 


MULBERRY LEAVES FOR THE “HONORABLE LITTLE GENTLEMEN 







- 


mm 


m 


- * 






ms ' 














©Ewing Galloway 

THE COCOONS, FROM WHICH MUCH PRECIOUS SILK WOULD BE MADE 












“The Honorable Little Gentlemen” 
anese call the silk worms, and the tiny 
creatures were hard at it, stuffing them¬ 
selves with food before settling down to 
the task of spinning their tight little silken 
houses that we call cocoons. From the co¬ 
coons much precious silk would be made, 
so Tu San and her family worked dili¬ 
gently to give the little worm spinners all 
the leaf food they needed. 

Once, as Tu San stumbled sleepily in 
with her great basket of leaves, she 
stubbed her toe painfully on the doorstep. 
She nearly—but not quite—gave an an¬ 
guished squeal. There’s an old tradition 
in Japan, that any harsh or noisy sound 
made within hearing of the “honorable 
little gentlemen” will ruin the quality of 
the silk they produce. So Tu San bravely 
kept quiet when she hurt her foot. Was 
she not a plucky little girl? 

[ 141 ] 


WANG CHU AND THE ROBBER 
An Exciting Night 

Wang Chu was very tired. He had made 
many trips from the room where the eggs 
were stored in baskets on the floor, to the 
room where the big, earthenware incu¬ 
bator was installed. This curious jar, with 
its outside looking like a huge, willow bas¬ 
ket, held over a thousand eggs. It had a 
close-fitting top and, in the lower part, an 
opening with a door. Into this opening a 
pan of live coals smothered with ashes 
could be placed. This produced the heat 
that kept the eggs warm and made them 
hatch. 

As always, Wang Chu’s father carefully 
counted the eggs from each basket and 
placed them in the jar. But this time 

[ 142 ] 


Wang Chu and the Robber 
Father Wang was troubled. For, from 
every container, some of the eggs were 
missing. A thief surely was stealing the 
eggs. How he did so was a mystery. For, 
by day and night, Father and Mother 
Wang took turns at watching the incu¬ 
bator, as the charcoal pan had to be 
tended diligently or the eggs would be 
ruined. They kept a close watch on the 
egg room, too, but to no avail. The eggs 
continued to disappear. 

Little Chu was troubled^ too. For late¬ 
ly, to help out, he had been taking his 
turn at tending the fire under the incu¬ 
bator to let his parents snatch a little 
sleep. Right now his mother and father 
and little brother were getting ready for 
bed. The matting rolls were spread on the 
floor. A quilt and a little wooden block to 
be used as a pillow were placed for each, 

[ 143 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

and in a few minutes the good people 

were slumbering. 

To the small boy, the thought of his lone 
vigil and the mysterious thief, perhaps 
coming for more eggs, were quite alarm¬ 
ing. Just to keep busy and fill his mind 
with work, he visited the incubator quite 
often. Now he stirred the coals with the 
iron poker to make more heat. Now he 
added a little ashes to cool the fire. And 
all the time, in spite of himself he listened, 
for what he knew not. 

He had that thief on the brain! 

In this district crops had been poor, 
food was scarce and high-priced, and 
much wicked thieving had been reported 
in both the village and the surrounding 
farms. 

“Pad-a-pad!” 

Wang Chu almost dropped the poker in 

[ 144 ] 



©Underwood and Underwood 

WANG CHU AND HIS YOUNGER BROTHER 



Tambalo and Other Stories 
his fright, for thuds as of some one walk¬ 
ing softly came to his ears. In his terror, 
he was about to awaken his father, when 
the “goof-goof” of their only pig re¬ 
assured him. It was piggy, that was kept 
for safety in a small pen built right be¬ 
side the dwelling. He must be rubbing 
his side against the wall. 

A little ashamed of his timidity, Chu 
squatted on his mat to renew his vigil. In 
the dimly lighted room, shadows flitted 
like ghosts among the furnishings. Every 
time he stirred the incubator fire, Chu 
imagined he saw a goblin peeping at him 
from behind the jar. 

An hour more passed, and nothing hap¬ 
pened. His wearied parents were enjoy¬ 
ing their much-needed rest. Chu him¬ 
self, now much calmer, began to have a 
deal of trouble to keep his eyes open. 

[ 146 ] 


Wang Chu and the Robber 
During his period of watching in the 
night, Chu never ventured into the egg 
room. Since the reports of robbers, he 
was afraid—terribly afraid—to go there 
alone, and his father did not bid him do 
so, for Chu was only a small boy. But 
now he would surely go to sleep if he 
didn’t do something exciting. 

Taking up his poker he stirred up the 
coals in the jar, then began to walk about. 
He neared the egg room, softly he opened 
the door and stepped in. Things looked 
just as usual. The eggs lay in their 
baskets on the floor, and no brawny 
burglar leaped out to grab him. He had 
conquered his fears and was turning to 
depart when a slight noise came to his 
ear. Turning quickly, to his horror, he 
saw the thief. Yes, and in the very act 
of stealing the eggs! His first impulse 

[ 147 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
was to run for help. But that would not 
do, for the thief was already making 
ready to escape. 

Gripping the handle of his poker, he 
sprang forward and brought it down, 
whack! on the head of a big, mottled 
snake that had swallowed so many eggs 
that he couldn’t run fast. 

“Blam, blim, blam!” thudded the poker, 
and at every jump Chu yelled louder 
and louder. 

Of course the great racket awakened 
Father and Mother Wang. They came 
rushing out to find the snake dead and 
Wang Chu dancing for joy that he had 
caught the thief. 


[ 148 ] 


PO I’O’S WONDER WATER 
Drilling a Well in Soochan 

Bim-bam! Creakity-creak! It was a 
fearsome sound that came from the other 
side of the great, gray wall that enclosed 
the compound of the strange white people. 

Po Po, the little Chinese boy, paused to 
listen. He had heard queer tales of these 
“foreign devils,” and on his daily trip to 
Lin Loo’s market to deliver his basket of 
fresh vegetables, he passed their quarters 
quickly, fearing always that some of the 
“evil sect” would rush out and drag him 
through the big iron gate. And then, once 
inside, no telling what might happen! 

Bim-bam! Creakity-creak! The sound 
continued, and Po Po’s legs were getting 
wabbly as he neared the dreaded gateway. 

[ 149 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 

But, ai-ee! What could it mean? The 
iron portal was wide open and a crowd of 
laughing, chatting people were hurrying 
through it. 

Curiosity overcame the little Chinese 
boy’s fears and in the wake of a kind¬ 
faced priest of the yellow robe, Po Po fol¬ 
lowed the crowd. 

On a plot of ground near one of the 
buildings was a pile of odd-looking ma¬ 
chinery that, with much grinding and 
groaning, was forcing a big iron pipe into 
the hard ground. Just as Po po and the 
native priest arrived near the spot, from 
out of the pipe a stream of bright water 
shot skyward. 

A great shout rent the air, as from the 
waiting throng burst forth the glad cry of 
“Water! Water!” The sound floated out 
over the gray-walled compound and was 

[ 150 ] 


Po Po’s Wonder Water 
echoed back from the fluted roofs of the 
nine-story pagoda that looked down on a 
city which for centuries had had no water 
save that which flowed through the filthy 
canals crisscrossing every portion of the 
ancient city. 

“Yah Shima!” gasped Po Po, “this it is 
that makes the woeful creakity-creak,” 
and with awe-struck eyes he gazed at the 
wonderful machinery that had bored five 
hundred feet into the earth and set free 
this flood of living water. When a man in 
strange foreign clothes gave him a cup of 
the first pure water he had ever tasted, 
and talked kindly to him, Po Po lost all 
fear of these American people who lived 
on the other side of the wall. 

You little American children, who have 
always had pure, clean water to drink, 
can hardly believe that in some parts of 

[ 151 ] 



©Underwood and Underwood 

THERE WAS WATER FOR EVERYTHING EXCEPT 
TO DRINK 





Po Po’s Wonder Water 
China many people have never tasted pure 
drinking water. 

In Soochan, where the scene of this lit¬ 
tle story is laid, the people use the water 
from the canal for every purpose. From 
stone steps leading down from back doors 
to the water, housewives wash the family 
rice and clothing, and the canal serves as 
a wastebasket and garbage can. In times 
of drought, the water becomes dreadfully 
filthy everywhere and often green from 
stagnation. 

Just think of having to drink this vile 
stuff! The Chinese people had learned 
from past experience that death lurked 
in every drop—so they never drank it 
unless it was boiled and made into tea. 

Now you see why it is, in this vast 
Empire of China, with its myriad of canals 
crisscrossing the country, that, from 
[ 153 ] 


Tambalo and Other Stories 
“babyhood to the grave/’ tea is the uni¬ 
versal drink. 

Money for boring this well in the old 
city of Soochan, was sent by the good peo¬ 
ple of the United States—the first of its 
kind seen in that district. 


[ 154 ] 





PRONOUNCING AND DEFINING 
VOCABULARY 


ai ( a'e) —an exclamation 
ai-ee (a-i-e)—an exclamation 
ai-he (a-i-he)—an exclamation 

Behring Strait (Be'ring Strat)—the narrow body of 
water which unites Behring Sea with the Arctic 
Ocean 

big-footed (big-foot'ed)—Chinese women with unbound 
feet are spoken of as “big-footed” 
bodice (bod'is)—a close fitting outer waist of a girl’s or 
woman’s dress 

caro mio (caro mee-o)—my dear 
chang-nai (charng-na'e) market 

character-writing (kar'ak-ter-rlt'ing) — expressing 
thought by symbols or pictures 
Chung-zu (Chdbng-zob)—a river in China 
compound (kom-pound') — an inclosure containing a 
house, outbuildings, etc., especially one occupied by 
foreigners in India, China, South Africa, East Indies 
coolie (koo'li)—a carrier or porter in India, China, 
Japan, Korea 

dyke (dik)—an embankment thrown up to prevent in¬ 
undations 

“foreign devils” (for'in dev'’ls)—the Chinese people, not 
wanting people from other lands in their country 
sometimes call these outsiders “foreign devils,” 
meaning “wicked people from other lands” 
Groningen (Gro-neen-zhen) 

Gulf of Manaar (Gulf of Ma-nar')—a body of water be¬ 
tween Ceylon and India 

guilders (gil-derz)—Dutch coins, 100-cent pieces 
Huk! Huk! (Huk! Huk!)—meaning “go! go!” 
huskies (hus'kiz)—Eskimo dogs 

[ 157 ] 


Pronouncing Vocabulary 


igloo (lg'loo)—the round-topped snow hut of the Eskimo 
incubator (m'ku-ba'ter)—an apparatus to hatch chickens 
jiky (jik'e)—a frame for carrying bundles 
Kotzebue Sound (Kot'se-bu Sound)—a large body of 
water indenting the west coast of Alaska 
kim-chi (kem'che)—pickled cabbage 
lava (la'va)—fluid rock such as comes from a volcano 
Mandarin primer (man'da-rm prim'er)—a Chinese book 
of old, old stories 

meteor (me'te-or)—a shooting star 
Mo-chin (mo-chin)—mother beloved 
moksa (mok'sa)—teacher 

muckluks (muk-luks)—sealskin boots worn by the Eski¬ 
mos 

mustachios (mus-ta'shoz) —whiskers 
myriad (mir'i-ad)—many 
Nangcha (Nang'sha)—a city in China 
narwhal (nar'hwal)—an Arctic whale about 20 feet long. 
The male narwhal has one long twisted pointed tusk 
projecting forward from the upper jaw like a horn 
Noango (No'an-go) 

nose ring (noz ring)—a ring put in the nose by which 
to lead the animal 

o ko sama (6 ko sa'ma)—the “honorable little gentle¬ 
men/' a nickname given the silk worms by the 
Japanese 

Ola (o'la)—an exclamation 

oomiak (oo'me-ak)—a large, broad Eskimo boat for 
women's use 

orange blossom tea (or'enj blos'um te)—a tea flayored 
with orange blossoms 

pagoda (pa-go'da)—a towerlike building, usually a tem¬ 
ple 

pewter (pu'ter)—an alloy of tin hardened with copper, 
much used for making domestic vessels 

[ 158 ] 


Pronouncing Vocabulary 


pinon nuts (pin'yon nuts)—the nutlike seed of the nut- 
pinon tree or nut pine tree 
pooksak (pook'sak)—a leather bag 
Popocatepetl (Po-po'ka-ta'pet’l)—a mountain in Mexico 
priest of the yellow robe—called so because many Chinese 
priests wear yellow robes 
pueblo (p way'bio)—an Indian settlement 
rickashaws (rik'i-shaz)—a two-wheeled carriage drawn 
by a man 

Roua Hala (Roo'a Ha'la) 

shoji (sho-je)—a sliding paper door 

Soochan (Soo'chan) 

Street of Towers—a Chinese street with many towers 
Tasakaluka (Ta-sa-kaTu-ka')—name of an Eskimo vil¬ 
lage 

“the long day”—meaning the Arctic summer, when the 
sun shines by day and by night for many weeks 
tookalakeeta (took-a'la-kee-ta')—the Arctic butterfly 
tucker (tuk'er)—a narrow piece of linen or lace worn 
folded over the breast, or attached to the gown at the 
neck 

Ukua (U-ku'a) 

vrouw (frou)—a wife. Used before a name, Vrouw 
means Mrs., as Vrouw Voost 
ya (ya)—an exclamation 
yah-shima (yah-shi'ma)—an exclamation 
Zuider Zee (Zi'der Ze')—a land-locked inlet, Netherlands 


PROPER NAMES 


Adahk—A'dahk 
Agoonta—A'goon-ta 
Ah-loo—Ah-loo 
Ah-sung—Ah'soong 
Arun—A'run 
A-taq—A'tak 
Bedder—Bed-der 
Beppo—Bep'po 


Bergetta—Ber-yet'ta 
Bianchi—By-an'ke 
Bik—Bik 

Chim-Chu—Ch!m-Chu 
Chitka—Chit'ka 
Chong Woo—Charng' Woo 
Drenky—Dren'ke 
Felipe—Fa-le'pe 


[ 159 ] 


Pronouncing Vocabulary 


Ging—Ging _ 

Giuseppa—J oo'sep-pa 
Glook-a-ta—Glook'a-ta 
Li Chi—Le Che 
Iomahda—T-6-mah'da 
Jacobina—Zha'ko-be'na 
Johnnie Chuckluk— 
Chuck-luk 
J unana—W u-na'na 
Katrinka—Kat-rin'ka 
Kaundi—Kaun'de 
Kee and Yaw— 

Kee and Yaw 
Keta—Ke-ta 
Li Loo—Le Loo 
Lin Loo—Len Loo 
Ling Wee—Ling Wee 
Marzana—Mar-zan'a 
Me-tu—Me'tu 
N aki vat—Na'ki-vat 
Nang Po—Nang'Po 
Naro—Na'ro 
Noonak—Noo'nak 
Nuk—Nuk 


O-Ke-Chan—o'Ke-Chan 
O-kee-ta-wa—o-kee-ta'wa 
0 Man—0 Man 
Paolo Nicolo— 

Pa'o-lo Nek'ko-lo 
Pidu—Pe-doo 
Po-po—Po-po' 

Quee-dee—Kwe-de 
Shama—Sha-ma 
Shimizu San— 

Shim'i-zu San 
Tambalo—Tam-ba'lo 
Teresa—Ter-e'sa 
Utvik—dot'vik 
Van der Groote— 

Van der Groo'ta 
Van Neif—Van Nef' 
Vetve—Vet-ve 
Wang Chu—Wang Chu 
Yamisura—Ya'mi-soo'ra 
Yano—Ya-no 
Yoda—Yo-da 
Yuni—Yu-ni 
Zat—Zat 


[ 160 ] 




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